Wingspan

Providing freelancers with the business tools they need to be successful.

Nearly all freelance professionals would prefer to focus on doing the work that they love rather than spend their time worrying about all the arduous operational tasks required to run your own company. Wingspan offers a membership service that streamlines administrative work like invoicing, hunting down payments, and managing benefits for freelancers. This saves precious time and allows members to focus on what matters most.

There are many products on the market that aim to help solve problems for freelance professionals, but none offer a holistic tool that addresses all of the aspects of running an independent business. Working closely with the Wingspan’s team we set out to create this one-stop solution, with a focus on helping freelancers get paid (a largely overlooked gap in the market). To do this we would build a progressive web application that aids freelancers in running every aspect of their business, through a clean and intuitive support platform designed to accommodate any need.

We began with an in-person, three-day workshop with the Wingspan CEO, Anthony Mironov, and other key stakeholders. This sprint was used to familiarize our team with the project objectives, review market research, canonize key personas, define user stories, and explore approaches for how we might solve their problems. After the kickoff we collected all of our learnings into a comprehensive project brief. To aid with fundraising for the the startup company we created a series of impactful slides for use in their investor pitch deck. With a polished business plan including reliable timelines, thorough design thinking, and preliminary mock-ups the Wingspan leadership team was able to successfully raise the funds needed to make the app a reality.

The solution we identified for MVP was to create a modular and scalable platform that enables freelancers to efficiently interface with their own personal operations team equipped with the resources and knowledge to meet every business-related need. The system we built was flexible enough to accommodate any problem, yet by using consistent repeatable patterns the app would be easy for members to use and for engineers to build. With a focus on user stories we created flow charts, defined the site map, designed wireframes, and built clickable prototypes to flesh out and test the product features.

Working on a strict deadline we refined the flows, nailed down the visuals, and brought everything into high fidelity. Since the application is web-based everything was optimized for a fully responsive environment. We made sure our designs were practical to implement and that all deliverables were thoroughly prepped for a smooth hand-off through regular reviews with the Product Owner and the internal development team at Underbelly.

By the time you read this, Wingspan should be live and in the wild. As I write this there is a waitlist in the thousands to join Wingspan, as people are excited to gain early access to the new application. We are excited for what's in store for our friends at Wingspan and look forward to working with them in the future to keep the research, validation, and iteration process going. After all, good design is never really done.